


Beautiful

by RaeC



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-03-14
Updated: 2005-03-14
Packaged: 2017-11-10 12:03:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/466059
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RaeC/pseuds/RaeC
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Severus was nothing, if not beautiful.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Beautiful

**Author's Note:**

> This story was originally only available by mailing list. Posting on the web for the first time.

Beautiful…

Harry ran his hand along Severus’ jaw and let his fingers explore the man’s face as he slept. Severus couldn’t stop him and wouldn’t wake. Dreamless Sleep did that to a person. It was that time of night when Harry could touch and taste and just be with him. No biting words or harsh expressions that crept just beneath his skin like an itch that refused to go away. It was one of those unspoken rules in their relationship; Severus hated to be touched. It woke something frightening in the man.

The nightmares had been bad this week and Severus couldn’t put off sleeping anymore. Harry made sure. He slipped the potion into Severus’ tea. Severus sneered in Harry’s direction, but drank the tea anyway all the while complaining about obnoxious brats who thought that they could get away with anything. It almost made him smile. Almost. But Harry didn’t.

Harry explored every inch anyway. The skin harsh and aging, dark lashes that framed equally dark eyes. Pitch-black eyebrows that seemed to have a life of their own and a repertoire of expressions that could slice open any lie without the need of his voice. When combined with a sneer, Severus could be deadly and often was. In fact, Harry couldn’t ever remember seeing his lips curl into any form of happiness only displeasure, disgust, and disappointment. Harry didn’t understand and didn’t try.

His hair never looked washed and barely combed on a good day. Somewhat like Harry’s own, only not so clean. Er, well, there was that once.

It really was only a face that a mother could love, nevertheless, Harry was fascinated. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. It’s the personality, not the looks. Love is blind. Harry snorted. There was nothing beautiful about Severus Snape. His personality was as harsh and biting as his looks. There was nothing hidden about Severus. And love being blind? That was the biggest joke of them all. It just chose to ignore or forgive whatever faults someone had, but it never failed to see them.

No, what made Severus Snape, Hero of the Battle of Gryfelden Glen, special was that he loved Harry Potter. Harry never understood why he just accepted it. He was no less beautiful than the man who slept at his side. A hideous burn that stretched the skin tightly across his bones marred his face. It was discoloured and wrinkled. Smooth and brittle. He couldn’t smile without causing the skin to crack and bleed. Therefore, Harry didn’t smile anymore. He’d lost the use of one of his arms, his wand arm, the appendage nothing more than a broken, disfigured thing that hung limply at his side. Harry wanted to laugh at the irony of it. A hex used to whither poisonous fruit on the vine took him from the battle. Harry had to learn to use his other hand, which could barely wrap itself around the wood after being broken so many times. In a couple more years, Harry would lose the use of his other hand and it terrified him. 

It was why he treasured these nights when Severus lay quiet and lax against the bedding. He was memorizing the man by touch before he lost the ability to touch him at all.

Worst of all, was his inability to give back the same pleasure that Severus graced him with on a nightly basis. Harry couldn’t get a hard on to save his life. Voldemort had seen to that. It was frustrating at times to get Severus to believed he enjoyed, no loved, the feel of the man buried deep inside him. Wanted it and needed it frequently. Anytime he could get close to Severus he was in heaven. So what if he was half a man never to be seen by polite company. He had Severus. 

“Potter.”

“Yes, Severus?”

“Must you continuously mal me in my sleep night after night?”

“Yes, Severus.”

“Then at least put your fingers to better use.”

Harry looked up into the dark eyes he loved so much and rolled onto his side placing pressure on his deformed arm. It hurt. He didn’t care. He slid his hand down Severus’ stomach slowly, increasing the pressure from a light caress to deep stroke that captured Severus’ cock. Harry revelled in the hiss he pulled from Severus as he began the uneven rhythm he knew Severus loved best. The man was as quiet as death at the best of times and every moan, or slight sigh was to be treasured as if it was to be the last.

Severus was almost there. It was written in the harsh lines of his face, the tautness of his body as he thrust up from the mattress, the erratic bursts of breath that escaped between his lips. And Harry loved every minute of it. 

Harry gave every fibre of his being over to that moment when Severus finally let go of everything, gave in, and whispered his name with a reverence that awed Harry every time he heard it. And whether Severus took him or Harry stroked or sucked Severus to completion, it didn’t matter. That barely heard word was Harry’s cue to look up and catch that part of Severus hidden from his endless admirers. 

“Harry…” In this bed, in the deepest darkness of night was the only time his given name would be spoken. No shields. No masks. Nothing but pure, raw male at the peak of his life.

Severus was nothing, if not beautiful.


End file.
